‘The Americans’ Recap: Season 2, Episode 9, ‘Martial Eagle’

If last week’s episode of “The Americans” touched on the consequences of our characters’ actions, this week delved right into the guilt that comes from making tough choices. The jobs these characters do often involve split-second decisions. When you’re forced to react without time to think, you can come face to face with your baser instincts. That’s what happened to Philip.

Ever since he shot the busboy in the first episode this season, Philip has seemed somewhat detached from his spy duties. Every death has scratched at him a little. But during his mission with Elizabeth—where the Jenningses have to infiltrate a Contra training ground—he’s forced into the most intimate killing he’s had to do. Slitting a man’s throat who just happened upon him was never his plan.

Where Elizabeth was wearing her guilt over Lucia’s death like a warm blanket, Philip is wearing his like a suit of armor. It changes the way he looks, acts and, most importantly, reacts to the things around him.

He understood the situation he was signing up for when he joined the KGB. But lately he’s becoming disillusioned. Including septic worker Louis freezing to death, these people paying the ultimate price for a cause Philip doesn’t seem to understand anymore. Their deaths have become pointless. Laying there as one man’s blood washes over his face, Philip flips a switch. If he’s going to be for Mother Russia, he has to be all in.

For him, that means being closed off from everything else. Elizabeth tells him that he didn’t have a choice. When you think about it, he really didn’t. If he were captured, he would have been tortured and killed, and all the work he’d done for the Center having been for nothing.

As he deals with these demons, his internal conflict permeates his cover life. The family he and Elizabeth have built has been showing cracks. Neither of them grew up with the freedoms American children have, and they’re raising two teens who know nothing of their parents’ hardships. To Paige, learning more about herself through a youth group makes perfect sense. She’s getting nothing from her parents but contempt, so why not seek acceptance elsewhere.

Even when she tries to include her family in her new interests, they go along with it like a mission. Neither are particularly interested in what’s going on for “teenage Sunday” at church. They do get points for feigning interest for the sake of their kid, though. In a way, they looked like almost any family at church: one person’s engrossed in the sermon about internal conflict (Paige), one is pissed about having to leave the house on a Sunday morning (Philip), one who’s playing an internal game of “anywhere but here” (Elizabeth), and one who’s practically asleep (Henry). Paige has become close with Pastor Tim and his wife, Alice, who want her to join them on a mission. She’s already donated $600 intended for a trip to Europe to the cause, which comes as a shock to her clueless parents.

“We’ll definitely talk about that,” Elizabeth tells them.

Elizabeth calls the donation stupid, but Paige doesn’t back down, saying she’s helping people and her parents don’t do anything for anyone. Philip’s quiet rage from a few weeks ago has boiled over into full-out angerball. He rips out the pages of Paige’s bible.

“You respect Jesus, but not us!” he yells, leaving his daughter in tears.

Philip and Elizabeth’s parenting skills are…questionable. They want their children to rely solely on them, no questions asked, just as they were raised. But they’re raising these children in a society that encourages the questioning of authority. They won’t tell their children about their true identities out of fear for their own or their children’s safety. It’s no wonder Henry is breaking and entering and Paige is looking to the church. They need to feel some form of self worth they’re not getting at home. Philip and Elizabeth aren’t completely neglectful. But they aren’t exactly attentive.

They do know how to exact punishment, though. Without preamble, Elizabeth wakes Paige up in the middle of the night and has her do housework. Elizabeth knows how lucky her children are, but doesn’t give them any frame of reference as to why.

“Being a grownup means doing things you don’t want to do, all the time,” Elizabeth tells her. ”It means working when you’re exhausted and almost never getting what you want when you want it.”

Her husband needs to heed her words of wisdom. Philip continues his misery-loves-company streak by playing the doctored tape for Martha. As Clark, he shows up to her apartment under the ruse of more quality time. Instead, he feeds her a line about the “pervish, cruel, nasty people” who populate the world (present company included). He offers her cold comfort, saying he loves the way she looks, then asks her to keep snooping around about stealth defense materials before leaving. Philip Jennings—dropper of misery bombs.

Before closing out the episode, Philip spreads his pain in one more spot: the church his daughter loves so much. He tells Pastor Tim and his hippie hair to not only stay away from Paige, but to push her away from the church. Tim senses Philip’s aggression and the danger of the situation, but he doesn’t provoke it. His calm may have saved his life, because Philip crushes windpipes.

“I see that you’re in pain, Mr. Jennings. There is grace and forgiveness for you, for everyone,” Tim tells Philip.

“Do you believe that?” Philip asks, both as a threat and out of curiosity.

“I do,” two words that may have saved Tim’s life.

Side thoughts:

* Oliver North had a story credit in this week’s episode, adding a bit of authority to the Cold War aspects of the ‘80s.

* Matthew Rhys edging out Keri Russell as my favorite actor on this show. He brings such authority to the quiet moments he has that you can’t help but marvel at him.

* Beeman’s story is so separate from everything else on the show, but it’s still intriguing because you know it’s going to lead to a big showdown in the end. He’s gained higher security clearance and is putting together the pieces involving Emmett and Leann’s deaths. Maybe he’ll find out who their murderer is before Philip and Elizabeth.

* And that’s good, because Sandra’s not playing games with him anymore. She was bold enough to tell him she’s having an affair but not leaving him. Yay, she has a purpose now!

* Gaad’s meeting with Arkady wasn’t as tense as it could have been. But an alliance between the middle men has potential.

* Elizabeth met a sponsor at AA who also works security at Northrop Grumman. I have no clue where this is going, but it could be interesting.

So what did you think? Do you like the darker side of Philip? How long do you think Fred, the KGB ally, is going to last once Beeman finds out he’s been lying? What do you think Larrick is going to now that he’s found out there were complications with the mission? It’s safe to assume Philip needs “Sopranos”-like therapy for his issues now, right?

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